Last month, a Canadian real-estate bro named Jordan Axani went on Reddit to explain that his girlfriend had broken up with him, leaving their "fairly wicked trip around the world for Christmas" in limbo. The plane tickets didn't require passport verification, and could thus be used by any resident of Canada named Elizabeth Gallagher—would any Liz out there perhaps like to accompany him dans le monde? Strictly platonically, of course. (Of course.)

Ads like this one got me thinking: Do people really ride outside of subway cars? Do they do it to the extent that the city of New York must spend thousands of dollars on an ad campaign advising mouth breathers not to take their own lives in their hands and screw up commutes for the rest of us? And if you were going to ride outside a train, would you really do it by clinging onto the outside edge of the closed door, terrified face pressed against the window so all inside could see your horror before you inevitably fell onto the tracks and died? The answer to all of the above is, sadly, "yes."